By James Maasz O’Connell (Wolsingham School)
They are burning our books
These arsonists in charge
Their lies and propaganda
Are more than just sparks
Every word that they utter
And fake sentence they string
Is fuelling the inferno
And the hatred it brings.
It’s happened before
In 1933
In a time of pure darkness
In scorched Germany.
Where these monsters of pain
They marched through the towns
And they raided the houses
And brought all the books down
To a great awful pyre
That pierced through the night
And one by one these books
Were thrown in to ignite.
And as they all burned
The children they cried
As their souls turned to ash
And their happiness died.
For a book is much more
Than fuel for a fire
It’s fuel for a mind
Of creative desire.
And a book is a spark
That kindles the flame
Of a child’s imagination
And it numbs the pain.
Of a world filled with monsters
Who kill for compliance.
Who torture those
Who even dare dream of defiance.
And I could never compare
Our privileged lives
With the horrors gone past
Yet still the spark thrives.
For although we like to believe
That the book about suffering
That has been shut, and been burned
That was only the beginning.
For just as all books
Are read again and again,
History repeats
And the story remains.
They are burning our books,
Not with matches and flames.
But with artificial unintelligence
And with the lies that they claim
Are the truth for they want us
To forget how to think.
To forget how to dream
How to write, how to speak.
These arsonists, you see
They think only of money.
And this smoke smothers their minds
Until it’s all that they can see.
They’re blind to the pain
They’re deaf to the screams
Of the children that suffer
As they die with their dreams.
That’s why, now more than ever
It is vital to read,
To write, to imagine
A world filled with peace.
And although it feels impossible
Remember those tales.
Where the protagonist seems
Inevitably destined to fail.
And yes, it’s not always easy
But more often than not
They vanquish the villain
By the end of the plot.
And if they burn all our books
Our story will survive
For they can never take away
Our freedom to write.
So, we’ll write our own story
Where the Arsonists burn
In the fires of freedom
Because now it’s our turn
To turn over the page.
To start intervening
For they can burn all our books
But we’ll never stop dreaming.
